Judging Freedom - Pepe Escobar: Up Front in the Donbass!

Episode Date: February 18, 2025

Pepe Escobar: Up Front in the Donbass!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. WGU is an online accredited university that specializes in personalized learning. With courses available 24-7 and monthly start dates, you can earn your degree on your schedule. You may even be able to graduate sooner than you think by demonstrating mastery of the material you know. Make 2025 the year you focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, February 18. Well, at least in the U.S., it is Tuesday, February 18, 2025. Pepe Escobar joins us from Moscow, where I guess it's a few minutes after midnight. Pepe, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank

you for staying up late for us. Thank you for accommodating our schedule. Always a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you for staying up late for us. Thank you for accommodating our schedule. Always a pleasure, Judge. Always a pleasure. Thank you. Before we get to your time in Donbass, from which you just returned, I want to ask you a couple of other questions about world events. Which produced the bigger reaction in Moscow, Donald Trump's suggestion that the U.S. would buy and own Gaza, or Donald Trump's revelation that he had spent 90 minutes on the phone with President Putin and that this would lead to a face-to-face meeting between Secretary of State Rubio and Foreign

Minister Lavrov, which, as we know, occurred today? Long question. And, okay, I could give a short answer, Judge. Ukraine, Putin, and Trump, because this is their war, as they define it here. Of course, they are immensely focused as well on Palestine, Russian diplomacy especially, but today the whole of Russia, especially Moscow, everybody was riveted following Riyadh and then the post-Riyadh declarations by both delegations

and the Lavrov wrap-up, which was extraordinary. That's Lavrov, right? Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, just one thing. He was visibly pleased, Judge, with the fact that finally there is a direct channel of communication, diplomatic, at the highest level. It's what he has been telling many of us for over a year here. Basically, aside from his joy, what did he reveal? I mean, we understand that they really went back to basics.

What they agreed on today was the size of their respective staffs and their respective embassies. I mean, I didn't even know that that was an issue. We're talking about stopping a war. And these guys are talking about, you know, how many CIA agents are going to pretend to be diplomats and show up at the American embassy in Moscow and vice versa at the Russian embassy in Washington. Absolutely correct because this is today was about establishing trust. And establishing trust means no hidden regime change or coral revolution style gimmicks in the background with these agents, of course.

So what Rubio said was also extremely interesting. He recognized that this was a groundbreaking moment. There were a lot of jokes here that Rubio did not dissolve in front of Lavrov because Lavrov is, wow, Lavrov is the Himalayas of diplomacy, right? Right. Rubio did not understand some of Lavrov's jokes. No, no. That was very interesting because Lavrov did not joke.

Since he arrived in Riyadh, he was very, very serious, and so was Ushakov. They made a slight joke to the fact that the American delegation was very surprised when they learned that American businesses lost over $300 billion by exiting the Russian market. Obviously, they didn't have this information. Wow. And this is Trump, a territory judge. Follow the money.

Right, George. Follow the money. Right, right. I know that they're not far from where I live in Port Newark. There's a hundred, I don't know how this could be, a hundred million dollars worth of Russian vodka sitting in a warehouse that can't be sold. So somebody lost money. The American importer lost money. The American importer lost money. The Russian exporter lost money. The Russian manufacturer lost money. But were the Americans, in other words, Marco Rubio is the Secretary of State. I know he's new at the job. And at this point in his career, we can't hold a candle to Foreign Minister Lavrov, who was the dean of foreign

ministers in the world. However, was he ignorant of the fact that American businesses suffered? Does he believe the nonsense that the American press and American intelligence community, and to a certain extent his boss the president have mouthed that russian economy has suffered under the sanctions whereas in reality the russian economy is better today than it was four years ago well it's crazy because the cia uh well until what a day or two they were fitting all sorts of stupidities to trump team 2.0 about the Russian economy. And at least today at the table, of course, you don't have the details at the table. They got a pretty good picture.

And Lavrov said that explicitly. Now they have a much better understanding of our position, which in Lavrov speak means now they understand not only our geopolitical imperatives, but also our geoeconomic imperatives. And this figure concerning American businesses losing money because they basically abandoned the Russian market was given by Kirill Dmitriev, who's the head of the Russian Investment Fund.

And he's always in very good contact with American businessmen who are now begging him literally to go back to the Russian market. Well, this was a very smart move because I doubt that Donald Trump knows this number. And as soon as they report to him, he's going to go, what? $300 billion? This podcast is sponsored by Talkspace. You know, when you're really stressed or not feeling so great about your life or about yourself, talking to someone who understands can really help. But who is that person?

How do you find them? Where do you even start? Talkspace. Talkspace makes it easy to get the support you need. With Talkspace, you can go online, answer a few questions about your preferences, and be matched with a therapist. We'll be right back. or just need a little extra one-on-one support, Talkspace is here for you. Plus, Talkspace works with most major insurers, and most insured members have a $0 copay. No insurance? No problem. Now get $80 off of your first month with promo code SPACE80

when you go to Talkspace.com. Match with a licensed therapist today at Talkspace.com. Save $80 with code SPACE80 at Talkspace.com. Wow. Wow. Wow. So it was indeed a breakthrough moment in terms of, okay, let's start from scratch. We are adults on the same table. You want to understand a little bit of Russia.

These are the basics to understand Russia. And nobody better than Lavrov to explain them. And from, I would say, a security point of view, Ushakov, direct advisor to Putin. Did they speak entirely in English, since

Minister Lavrov is fluent in English? Lavrov is totally fluent in English. Ushakov, more or less. Dmitriev as well. We don't know, George, if there was instant translation. Probably for certain stretches, yes. Okay. So President Putin and the Russian delegation are ecstatic at the first meeting. Secretary Rubio and the American delegation

are happy at the first meeting. Did they agree to meet again? Are they meeting tomorrow or have they gone home? No, no, no. They are now establishing, let's say, parallel channels of communication, including the one that everybody was paying attention to, which is going to be Ukraine.

Ushakov said that Putin himself is going to designate his top negotiator on Ukraine, and the Americans are going to do the same thing. It's probably going to be a team on both sides. Did Marco Rubio say, hey, Sergei, here's my cell. Call me whenever you want. I'm not Tony Blinken.

Did we have something like that? No, Judge, because he was visibly intimidated. All the footage and all the photos that we saw, he looked intimidated. I was worried about that, but I didn't want to raise it. As long as you have raised it, that we saw, he looked intimidated. But at least... I was worried about that, but I didn't want to raise it.

And as long as you have raised it, is that a serious issue? I mean, almost any foreign diplomat would be intimidated in the presence of Sergei Lavrov. The Africans usually are not. You know why? Because he immediately starts cracking jokes with the Africans. The Latin Americans, the same thing. In Southeast Asia,

you know, they're very affable with the Indonesians, Thais, Malaysians, etc. But of course, after three years without talking face-to-face with the Americans, this is a new ballgame completely. In fact, in the column that I wrote, I tried

to frame it as the beginning of, real beginning of a new great game, because now we have both superpowers talking face to face and hopefully with mutual respect, which is something that emphasize over again what went on in valdai moscow that you observed and participated in last week it was that you wrote a column about this involved the plo it's involved bricks it involves involves Syria, it involves Turkey. What happened there? This was the annual Valdai Middle East Conference, Judge, which it's a complicated affair because some of the scholars and the experts that they call are, I would say, irrelevant to the conversation or they don't bring anything extra. And some technically are excellent.

For instance, there was a guy from Azerbaijan talking about corridors of connectivity. He was brilliant. He coined the expression corridor mania, talking about Azerbaijanis involved in at least 13 different connectivity corridors with everybody, with Russia, China, with the Americans as well. So this was pretty, pretty good.

The presence of Palestine was not what we were expecting. They called somebody from the PLO, repeating basically PLO. Everybody knows already what the PLO thinks. And the PLO is not independent, as we all know. There was nobody from Hamas or the opposition or somebody representing Gaza, for instance. But, and very important, the Syrian ambassador to Moscow, he was supposed to be on the panel, and at the last minute he said, no, no. So everybody was expecting to be on the panel, and the last minute he said, no, no. So everybody was expecting

to hear from him. What is the new Syria? Can you explain to us? Unfortunately, he was not there. Wow. Tell us about your trip to Donbass.

First, your general impressions, and then I'm going to ask you some specific questions. Of course. Where were you and how long were you there and what is the impression that you came away with? It was a very powerful

emotional experience. It was in the space of one year since February last year. This was my third trip to Donbass. But this was 11 months after the last one where I managed to go to Avdivka, which at the time had been liberated only a few days before. And it was a very complicated trip because Avdivka was still being shelled and there were drones all

over our FPV drone locators they were blinking red all the time and now was incredible of course when you enter Avdivka it's like the set of an apocalypse movie and you are right in the middle of it it's total destruction everywhere but now you see glimpses here and there of uh for instance they explained to me that each apartment block there are all of them destroyed the ones who are being rebuilt they are rebuilt by a specific company from a specific Russian region with a timetable where it's public. And I managed to enter two of them who are already rebuilt in the space of less than one year. Very impressive. There are some shorts. This is an area that under Russian law is Russia.

Under international law is Russia. Under international law is Russia. The Ukrainians claim it's Ukraine, and the Ukrainians are bombing and killing what they say are their own people. Do I have this correct? Avdivka, judge, I think the best definition of Avdivka is a company town founded in where a big coke chemical plant was founded during the Soviet Union in 63 and they had more than 40,000 people working at this town. It was part of Ukraine during the USSR, of course. In this past three years after the start of the special military operations abdivka became a fortress shelling donetsk and the outskirts of

donetsk non-stop so he had to be liberated by the donetsk army with the help from Russian army, helped by the Chechens as well. And this happened one year ago. Got it. And I was there and I was there two days before one year of the liberation. So it was a very, very emotional moment.

And a contraposition to the Munich security conference. Instead of going to Munich to see the war, you go to Avdiivka. Avdiivka, you'll really see the war. Did you observe or did you learn of people taking shelter in two monasteries, one for priests and one for nuns. Yes. Notwithstanding the religious sanctuary internationally attributed to houses of worship, like the

Israelis in Gaza destroying mosques, the Ukrainians were attempting to destroy these monasteries in order to kill the people inside. Do I have this right? Absolutely correct, George. This was Sunday morning. We were in Avdiivka on Saturday. And imagine in the morning you are in the middle of a total destruction zone. In the afternoon, I was face to face with the Donetsk Philharmonic with an opera singer out of this world singing popular tunes of the 1960s. So this gives us the spirit of Donetsk.

It's a working man's town, but it's a cultural mecca as well. This Philharmonic is considered one of the best in Russia, and they are absolutely outstanding. Well, on Sunday morning, we went to Ugledar. Ugledar, just to give you an idea, was liberated four months ago only. So basically, the Ukrainians were on top of a hill on the other side of the main highway, and they were shelling everything in Ugledar, in the outskirts of Ugledar,

and including this particular monastery compound. It's two monasteries, a male and female, a church, and some convents around. And they showed me, which is something absolutely incredible, a female convent was bombed by five HIMARS in sequence, and a lot of nuns were killed. of selecting this internationally protected and obviously non-military target, a convent with nuns in it? What would the Ukrainians gain by killing these nuns? Nothing. It's terrorism. It's basically terrorizing the population. When I was still in Avdivka, I was talking to two ladies in their early to mid 60s and one of them had been

a hostage in the basement of her apartment block for months, along with 10 or 12 other people. They were barely surviving, they had no water, no electricity, had a small generator and they were being kept there as kinds of hostages by the Ukrainian army when they were still occupying several of these apartment buildings. So it's the banality of evil expressed as terrorizing civilians, which the regime in Kiev is a master. This is what they do essentially. It is a terrorist regime. And including terrorizing their own citizens in Ukraine. Can you imagine what they consider rebel? Like those traitors, Russian-speaking traitors in the eastern Ukraine, Novorossiya. So the bombing, the shelling of this monastery, which the church is absolutely extraordinary. And when you enter the church, not only it's beautiful inside,

but there's two people living inside the church, around 50 or so. A few months ago, there were 250, almost 300, because it was the only safe place in the surroundings, even bombarded because the church is more or less subterranean, unlike the monasteries, you see. So even if they were shelling, they were protected by living inside the church. And I still saw basically elderly people who are too afraid to go anywhere. They are living literally inside the church. You see their beds.

There's a communal kitchen. And right in front of them, there's a priest celebrating Mass. What language is spoken there? Is it Ukrainian or Russian? They all speak Russian. They're all Russian speakers. Russian speakers, Russian culturally, Russian historically. Culturally Russian, Orthodox Christians, Russian culturally, Russian historically. Culturally Russian, exactly.

Orthodox Christians, Russian. Absolutely, absolutely. What is your observation about the movement of the front lines westward? I talked to commanders, and one of these commanders, we became very good friends since my previous visits and he said that they are advancing steadily west in the directions of pokrovsk once they get pokrovsk everything front of them is open there will be no resistance and they can go anywhere they want literally Literally. Some of the commanders say that the order for a massive strike or avalanche is not coming. It should have come already.

So there are different points of view about it. And other ones say, no, this is what we usually do. And we are advancing steadily. And they are falling in front of us. We organize cauldrons and mini cauldrons. They fall into it. And now they're running out of weapons, running out of men, running out of motivation. So, for instance, when we're trying to discuss Munich Security Conference,

and this was a few days before today's meeting in Riyadh, they were deeply skeptical. Most of them don't think that anything will come out of it and they say look we the front line we are going to solve this thing were you able to glean from your communications with uh russians in the dunbus their attitude about America, the American government, and the American people? No, this time, no, Judge, because I was specifically focused on, in Luhansk, in Donetsk, seeing the first signs of normalization in both big cities of Donetsk Republic and Lugansk Republic. Lugansk now is

a booming town, and Donetsk is the same, but you still hear the odd loud boom in the middle of the night. It's still there, but it's not being shelled like a year ago when it was almost... Do they know that the booms are caused by

American weapons and American ammunition? Of course. They know everything. Technically, Judge, they know everything, especially in Donetsk. Donetsk is also a communication center. It's a connectivity corridor for the whole of Donbass. So they know where the HIMARS, how do they get there, the Wunderwaffen coming from Europe.

They know everything. Now, at least, you feel for the first time a feeling in the nets that it's slowly stabilizing because now the front line is very far away. According to the calculations of one of the commanders, the front line now is around 50 kilometers away from Donetsk. To give you an idea, when I was there a year ago, it was four kilometers outside of Donetsk. Well, there's a sizable difference, and you feel it in the city. The city is way more relaxed. Do you have any feeling for when the Ukrainians will give up the ghost, either because they don't have any more soldiers or they don't have any more

equipment or they don't have any more urge to fight? It basically, we'll see when the Russians arrive in Pokrovsk and take over Pokrovsk, and there's another information that one of the commanders told me is relative. It is secret, in fact. All the parts of the front who may collapse even faster. But he asked me not to talk about it. So they expect big, big changes, let's say, in the next two to three months all along the front lines. And this will be in parallel to the negotiations between Team Trump and Team Putin.

Yes. Fascinating conversation. What a fascinating life you live. You're back in Moscow now, right? Well, I am an old school foreign correspondent, Judge. This is what we do. We go places. Well, travel safely and well, my dear friend, and thank you from the bottom of my heart for accommodating our schedule here in the U.S. God love you. I'm off to Lebanon. So our next conversation is going to be about Lebanon. You got it.

We'll look forward to it, my man. Be well. Thank you. Thank you for joining us. Pleasure. Cheers. What a great, great human being. The gift to call him a colleague and a friend.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, 11 o'clock in the morning, Colonel Douglas McGregor. Two in the afternoon, Aaron Mate. Three in the morning, Colonel Douglas McGregor. Two in the afternoon, Aaron Mate. Three in the afternoon, Phil Giraldi. Four in the afternoon, Professor Jeffrey Sachs. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. With courses available online 24-7 and monthly start dates, WGU offers maximum flexibility so you can focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu.